Ty unfolded the letter from his grandmother and began to read.
Dearest Tyler,
If you are reading this, then I've passed and joined my beloved David on the other side. I know you grieve for me, but know that I lived a long and wonderful life, and I am well prepared to meet my maker.
Inside this box are two journals written by the man you were named after, the first Ty McGuinn. The journals are very strange, in that your ancestor speaks of things that, at first blush, seem unbelievable. Yet, after he died, most of the things he said would happen, eventually came to pass. Of course, for you, all he wrote is ancient history, as he made no claims past the year 1977. You'll see why that is when you start reading.
All I ask is that you read the journals, especially the one titled El Paso, with an open mind. If nothing else, you will be reading a first-hand account of the life of one of the most fascinating men to ever live.
Love Always,
Izzy
Ty slipped the note back into the box and slid it under his bed. He would eventually read the journals, but they would have to wait until after he avenged the woman who gave them to him.
Ty slept well that night, knowing that starting the next day, he would begin his quest for revenge.
The second day after Isabel McGuinn's funeral, Pete Colon arose before the crack of dawn to get an early start on his survey of the northeast pasture's fences. He still mourned for Miss Isabel, but he thought the best way to honor her memory was to keep the rancho the best in Texas.
He would check the fences today and send out a crew tomorrow to affect the repairs. The fence would have to be surveyed on foot, in order to inspect both wire and posts, so the lanky foreman was anxious to get most of the survey completed before the stifling heat of mid-day.
After a twenty-minute drive along a bumpy dirt road, Pete parked his dusty F-350 truck in front of a locked farm gate, which opened onto the huge pasture. After unlocking the padlock, he swung the gate open until it came to rest against the fence, then climbed back into the cab, intending to drive the truck inside. Just as he reached for the gear shift lever, however, he caught some movement in his peripheral vision.
Pete quickly unsnapped the holster strap securing his .44 magnum Ruger Red Hawk, and prepared to draw it. All the ranch's cowboys were armed now, and on constant alert since the attack on the hacienda. It could have simply been a white-tail deer or a stray cow, he told himself, but what with all the illegals, drug smugglers and other two-legged critters regularly trespassing on the ranch, he wasn't taking any chances.
Pete's eyes scanned the heavily wooded area where he had spotted the movement. It was still early dawn, but his sharp eyes suddenly caught more movement in the thick underbrush. Suddenly, he heard the sound of human voices, and gasped in surprise as men, women and children began boiling out of the nearby woods, headed at a dead run toward his truck. Before Pete could react, the illegals began clambering into the bed of his pickup.
"Well I'll be damned..." Pete muttered to himself, "They must think I'm here to transport them to the Promised Land."
He continued to watch in disbelief, as the illegals tightly packed themselves into the bed of his truck. When all of them were loaded, he counted twelve. There were five young men, four women, and three children. As Pete stared dumbfounded at his dozen passengers, one of the men looked directly at him.
"What are you waiting for, hombre? Get the hell out of here!" The man yelled in Spanish.
Pete shrugged his shoulders and started the engine.
"Sure amigo," he answered, "whatever you want."
Early that same morning, Stella Woodson and Ty were sitting at the kitchen table, drinking coffee and discussing how their fake romantic relationship was going to work. Surprisingly, Stella was doing most of the talking. Not only did the big cowgirl not have a problem playing at being his mistress, she actually liked the idea.
"So Boss, I figure we'll have to share a room when we travel to make this convincing, and be affectionate out in public," she said conversationally.
Ty grunted and cleared his throat.
"Uh, yeah, I guess we do, I hope that doesn't bother you too much," he stammered.
She smiled and waved her hand dismissively.
"Nah, it's part of the job, so it doesn't bother me. Now about those clothes you mentioned. I assume that since I'll be undercover as your girlfriend, I need to be classy, but a little sexy."
Ty nodded, his mouth suddenly dry at the thought of Stella wearing something any sexier than those faded Levi 501s. He dug out his wallet and handed her a platinum American Express Card issued in the name of the ranch.
"Buy enough for at least three weeks. Think about how Tiffany dressed and buy that quality, okay?"
Before Stella could answer him, Ty's Nextel alerted. He flipped it open and glanced at the screen, then pressed the push to talk button.
"Good morning, Pete, what's up?"
"Boss, you ain't in a million years, gonna believe this," Pete said incredulously.
"Okay, what am I not going to believe?"
"I've got me a bunch of border jumpers in the bed of my truck ... I stopped to open the northeast pasture gate and they just hopped in."
"Come on Pete, you're pulling my leg, right?"
"I knew you wouldn't believe me. I can hardly believe it myself, but I got twelve illegals in the back of my truck."
"Where are you now?" Ty asked.
"I'm out on the highway, headed into town. I figured I'd haul them over to the sheriff's office and dump them in his lap."
Ty chuckled to himself as he imagined the sheriff fuming over the bureaucratic hassles which usually accompanied the arrest, incarceration, and eventual deportation of illegal aliens. He shook his head and grimaced in disgust as he thought about the inept county, state, and federal agencies who were supposed to stop the invasion of America's border states. The politicians and bureaucrats could talk tough about stopping the illegal flood, but their talk was rarely matched by action. If anything, they acted like they wanted the invasion to continue, and often interfered with any individual or group that tried to secure the border.
Raúl Diaz Mendoza slipped out of bed and looked down at the sweat-soaked, unconscious woman still lying there. She was a magnificent creature, beautiful and passionate. Yes, this one he would keep for a while.
Raúl tugged on his silk robe and pressed the call button at the base of the bedside lamp. Seconds later, a big, burly man who moved with a panther-like grace, squeezed into the room through a concealed doorway. The big man looked down on the woman sprawled naked on the rumpled sheets.
"She is quite lovely, eh, José?" Raúl asked.
José Orosco nodded emphatically.
"Si, patron, and she is also as photogenic as one would expect. The videos are outstanding. Doctor Duval's drugs seemed to work better on her than most other women."
Raúl smiled at that. He taped all his conquests, a large group of women that included more than a few Hollywood actresses, but Felina was the cream of the crop so far, even without the mood-altering drug his chief chemist had concocted.
"I like this one a lot, José. Tell Duval that I might need another dose of his miracle powder tomorrow. She should sleep through the night, so I can do some work and you can call it an evening, my friend."
Raúl Mendoza was one of the wealthiest men in the world. His Omni-Global Holdings Company bought and sold businesses with seemingly reckless abandon, yet Mendoza somehow always came out ahead. The explanation for that was simple, yet the execution tediously complex. See, Raúl Mendoza was secretly the head of the largest drug cartel in the world, and Omni-Global was in fact a huge money-laundering scheme.
Raúl's genius lay in his ability to isolate himself at the top of his carefully crafted pyramid. Only four men in the world knew his true power, and none of the four had ever met him as Raúl Diaz Mendoza. As the head of the shadowy drug cartel, he was known as Quetzalcoatl, the ancient Aztec god of knowledge.
As Raúl Mendoza, he was the most powerful and richest man in the Mexican state of Jalisco. As Quetzalcoatl, he was the most powerful and richest man in Central and South America.
Raúl stepped out onto the balcony of his penthouse and surveyed at the twinkling lights of the boats dotting the Bahia de Banderas (the Bay of Flags). His penthouse occupied the entire tenth floor of the step pyramid shaped Aztec Hotel. Raúl owned the hotel; it was a major dumping point for laundered drug money. According to the hotel's records, the place had enjoyed an occupancy rate of over ninety-two percent, even though the staff seldom saw half that many paying guests.
The largest set of twinkling lights in the bay belonged to his mega-yacht, the two hundred foot long Atlacamani (the Aztec goddess of hurricanes.) As Raúl watched the boats, an idea struck him and he buzzed José on his Blackberry.
"José, sorry to bother you, but I just had an idea. We'll be taking the yacht out tomorrow evening for a run through the canal to Belize. Before we leave, I want the ship's name changed to the Felina."
Raúl had been infatuated with Felina since meeting her at a charity event she attended with her husband, the racecar driver. When Raúl heard that Felina and Juan-Pedro Balarto had divorced, he created an opportunity to meet her socially at a big New York fashion party. At the party, he'd invited her to visit him in Puerto Vallarta. He found it delightfully ironic that she was here now because of his alter ego Quetzalcoatl's cocaine. Raúl had no thought about the great aunt Felina had lost in the avenging of the captured shipment. The lives of others did not matter to Raúl in the least.
A week after Isabel's funeral, Ty and Stella made their first public appearance together. The occasion was a charity event for the El Paso Museum of Art. Tyler had chosen this particular event because he knew it would be well attended. Ty's plan was to mingle with his old friends and acquaintances, introduce Stella around, and casually mention a lengthy vacation they were jointly planning. He figured gossip would fill in the gaps and turn the brief appearance into a torrid affair that would cover his being away for a while. Ty also figured his major task that evening would be to help his big cowgirl negotiate the pitfalls of dining and dancing in the so-called, 'polite society'. As was usually the case when it came to women, Ty figured wrong.
Stella was staying in one of the guest suites of the hacienda by then, so she could provide Ty better security. In addition to Stella, Reuben Graves had contracted a private security company to man the main gate and the gate to the truck stop. Pete Colon insisted both day and night wranglers operate in pairs, and asked Ty not to wander around alone at night either. Ty had agreed, and on the two occasions he'd been out at night, Stella rode with him. Ty learned quickly what Pete already knew, Stella was better on the back of a horse than anyone he'd ever met.
Ty knew he'd made some wrong assumptions as soon as Stella sashayed into the living room, wearing a burgundy, knee-length cocktail dress with matching heels. Her short blond hair framed her face nicely and her green eyes looked huge. She wore a single strand of pearls and carried a small clutch purse that matched her ensemble. She was even more attractive than he'd thought, plus she was built like the proverbial ... well you know. Ty was especially impressed with her legs, because she was taller than his six two in the three inch heels she wore, and most of that height seemed to be well-shaped legs.
Stella grinned when she saw his gape-mouthed reaction. Even though she was much more comfortable in jeans and a work shirt, it was nice to know she still had it when she dressed up. Ty looked good in his tux too, she decided. The tuxedo jacket emphasized his broad shoulders and narrow waist. Her grin widened when she noticed he was wearing shiny black cowboy boots with silver trim, instead of the usual black patent leather formal shoes. She looked up at his eyes when he cleared his throat.
"Wow, you look amazing, but where is your gun?" he blurted.
She gave him a coy smile and hitched the hem of her full skirt up so he could see the Glock and holster Velcroed inside her left thigh. Ty nodded his approval, not only at the weapon, but also at the thigh-high stay-up stockings she wore.
Ty's idea of making them a couple in a big way worked to perfection as they mingled with his friends and contemporaries at the fund raiser. Ty had a good time, in spite of himself, as Stella turned out to be the perfect date for the occasion. Stella was solicitous towards him, and held his arm for the entire function. It was easy to introduce her around, because everyone, it seemed, wanted to meet the woman who finally dragged Ty out of the doldrums he'd been in since the death of his wife. Stella was a constant surprise to him, as she made witty small talk and seemed perfectly comfortable at the formal soirée.
They stayed two hours and headed home. On impulse, Ty had Señor Peron, who was chauffeuring them around in his grandmother's black Lincoln Towncar, stop at the big eat-in Dairy Queen on North Piedras Street. Stella laughed delightedly when they pulled into the parking lot.
"You sure know how to turn a girl's head, Boss Man," she said.
After large hot fudge sundaes, Señor Peron dropped them off at the hacienda's grand entry. Ty walked Stella to her room and kissed her on the cheek before she went in.
"I had fun tonight Stella, and it was all your fault," he said.
Stella laughed, leaned forward and pecked him on the lips.
"I had fun too. Who would have thought that?" she replied.
Ty thought about the evening after he slipped between the cool Egyptian cotton sheets of his bed. The evening had gone much better than he expected it would, and he and Stella had certainly given the folks there something to gossip about. Ty figured a couple more public dates, and then he and Stella would disappear on a long vacation to Tahiti or some other remote location. Tongues would wag over that, he was sure, but he would have the cover he needed for what he planned to do next.
Ty sighed as he thought about how fantastic Stella looked in that dress.
"Careful, boy," he chastised himself, "she's your body guard and camouflage, not your real girlfriend."
Ty discovered why Stella was comfortable at the charity event when Tiffany called him Sunday morning. After exchanging pleasantries, Tiffany got right to the point.
"So Romeo, have you seen the style section of the paper yet this morning?" she asked.
Ty put down the comics and rooted through the paper until he found the correct section.
"Not yet," he admitted, "but I've got it right here."
"You and Stella are all over the thing, in pictures and the gossip column. I'll give you this much, you sure know how to pick them. Until I read that gossip column, I thought she was just some wild ass cowgirl."
As Ty rustled the paper, trying to find the right page, he frowned at his sister-in-law's cryptic remark.
"What are you talking about, Tiff?" he asked her bewilderedly.
Tiffany looked at the phone incredulously; it was just like Tyler to be this clueless.
"Just read the paper and call me back," she said in a fit of giggles.
Ty shook his head at Tiffany's antics, then found the page for which he was looking. In the very first picture, he and Stella were captured by the camera standing with a group of oil company executives. Ty marveled at how photogenic the smiling Stella was, and how naturally she held his arm. He made a note to himself to have Reuben Graves snag a copy of that photo from the paper, and started reading the 'People Watcher' gossip column. He and Stella headlined the report.
Last night, El Paso's society welcomed back Tyler Lopez McGuinn, a scion of the McGuinn dynasty, and the owner of the beautiful Rancho de Los Angeles. After a three year absence from the social scene, Tyler returned in smashing style, accompanied by Miss Stella Louise Woodson, the daughter of State Senator (Republican, from Plano) and professional football hall of famer, Jon Roy Woodson. Jon Roy Woodson, you will recall, was a mainstay on two Dallas Cowboy Super Bowl teams, and was selected for the pro bowl ten times.
Miss Woodson herself is a world-class athlete, competing in the 2000 Summer Olympics as a member of the USA women's volleyball team. Miss Woodson was a three-time volleyball All American at Texas A&M, where she also played soccer and softball.
Your intrepid reporter thought the cute canoodling couple was adorable, and hopes to see them out and about more often...
Stella strolled into the kitchen a few minutes later wearing her ubiquitous Levi's and checkered shirt. She poured a cup of coffee and plopped down next to him.
"Morning Boss Man," she chirped.
In spite of his best effort, Ty had to smile; she was delightfully cheerful in the morning and her mood was infectious.
"Morning Sunshine, we made the style section. The gossip columnist said we were 'adorably cute'," he said as he passed her the paper.
She read the short article and glanced up at Ty.
"I never use my father's name when I apply for a job or throw his name around to keep one. If I can't get it on my own, I don't want it."
Ty shrugged and nodded, he figured it was something like that.
The following Monday, ten days after Isabel McGuinn's funeral, Pete Colon drove his personal pickup truck over to his cousin Rudy Soto's pawn shop on Alameda Avenue. Rudy took him behind the counter and into his office, and handed Pete a soft-sided pistol case.
"The pistol is pristine, Petey. I bought it twenty years ago from the army, after they finished test-firing them over at Fort Bliss, when Beretta was competing for the M-9 contract with the military. Because it is a hand-assembled test bed, it is not serial numbered. BATFE regulations prevent me from legally selling it, so Merry Christmas. The new threaded barrel came from DRM Precision Weapons over in Waxahachie; you owe me two-seventy-five for that. The two high cap magazines are factory fresh, and are twenty-five bucks each."
Pete nodded in approval, then he field stripped the Beretta and swapped out the barrel. The pistol was tight and the action smooth as silk. It would do nicely. He handed a surprised Rudy ten Benjamins.
"Take your family somewhere nice to eat on me."
Rudy smiled and pocketed the money. With nine kids at home, dinner out was an expensive proposition.
Back at the maintenance barn at the ranch, Pete surveyed his supply of aluminum tubing. Pete was a big fan of the thick walled aluminum pipe because it was easy to machine, and very strong for its weight. He selected a section that had an outside diameter of an inch and a quarter. He knew this would be on the slim side for a 9 mm suppressor, but anything larger would block the pistol's sights. Besides, the suppressor design he had in mind would be a hybrid, making use of the latest developments in firearm suppressor technology, combined with some older but effective design concepts. The guts of this suppressor would be more efficient at noise suppression, thus permitting a smaller 'can'.
Pete took the tube over to the band saw and cut off a six-inch length. Again, compared to most 9 mm suppressor cans, this was quite short, especially considering the small diameter. A can this size would be fine for a .22 caliber firearm, but 9 mm suppressors normally required a larger expansion chamber in order to adequately trap and cool the hot expanding gasses.
The suppressor tube would need to be threaded internally at both ends, so Pete inserted it into the chuck of the shop's metal lathe, and set up the longitudinal feed for cutting fine threads. After affixing a thread-cutting tool to the lathe's tool-post, he began the thread-cutting process. Once both ends had been threaded internally, the next task involved making the end-caps.
Pete returned to the shelves of metal and selected a length of solid round aluminum stock, whose diameter was slightly larger than the suppressor can. He chucked this piece into the lathe and affixed a regular cutting tool to the post. After taking a measurement of the tube's internal diameter with a dial caliper, he looked up the threading tables in his machinist's handbook to determine what diameter the end-caps would need to be turned down to before threading them. After reducing the round stock to the required diameter, he replaced the thread-cutting tool and cut matching threads for one end-cap. Since this first end-cap would be the one which would screw onto the pistol's barrel, its borehole also needed to be threaded. After making the second end-cap, Pete used a knurling tool to knurl the end-caps to make disassembly easier. As a final detail, Pete sprayed the tube and end-caps with a black matt epoxy finish. Now it was time to make the internal components of the suppressor.
In order to make a suppressor that was both compact and effective, Pete opted to use a sound-suppression technique that was developed during WW II. Instead of the conical-shaped metal baffles used in most modern suppressors, Pete took a sheet of quarter-inch thick urethane, and punched out eight round disks. These disks, known as 'wipes', would be located inside the front end of the suppressor, each separated by spacers. When a bullet passes through these urethane wipes, the exit hole tends to close, thus sealing in the noise-making gasses, long enough for cooling and controlled release to reduce the report. Such suppressors were given the name 'Hush-Puppy', because they were used to quietly eliminate sentry dogs.
This early 20th-Century technology would have been adequate with a larger can, but in a suppressor this small, its performance would be unacceptable. That's where Pete's melding of old and new suppressor technologies made the difference.
Pete had found references on the Internet, describing suppressors which use "artificial environment" or "wet" technology. This cutting-edge technique involves spreading light oil or lithium grease inside the suppressor. These act as a coolant on the hot gasses. Suppressors using this technology can be much smaller, while at the same time, quieter.
Pete coated the inside surfaces of the suppressor with a liberal coating of lithium grease, then screwed on the end-caps.
After finishing the suppressor, he made one small but necessary modification to the M9. Since the Beretta was a semi-automatic, the pistol would make unacceptable noise as it cycled another round from the magazine into the chamber. To prevent the slide from blowing back, Pete notched the slide so it could be manually locked in place with a modified version of the lever that locked the slide to the rear when the magazine was empty. His 'slide lock', when activated, would prevent the pistol from ejecting a spent round, thus eliminating most all mechanical noise.
Pete screwed on the suppressor and loaded the magazine with ten rounds of Winchester 147-grain sub-sonic ammo. The sub-sonic projectiles did not break the sound barrier so there was no 'crack' when they were fired.
Stepping outside the doorway to the workshop, he jacked a round into the chamber, activated the slide lock, and aimed at a dirt mound about fifty yards away.
Dink ... thump!
The performance was better than he had hoped for. The only noise made by the pistol was the dink of the firing pin hitting the primer, followed by the thump of the bullet as it impacted the dirt mound. Pete manually ejected the spent cartridge and loaded another round. This time he took aim at an old hubcap that was propped up against a fence post about seventy-five yards away.
Dink ... CLANG!
The hole was nearly dead center. Pete jacked in another round, but this time he left the slide-lock off.
Ding ... CLANG! ... dink ... Clang!
The shots were only marginally louder this time, the tight framed weapon barely made a whisper as the slide cycled. Satisfyingly, the hubcap now had three holes in its center.
Pete was grinning from ear to ear as he entered the ranch house with the unloaded pistol.
"Hey boss ... I got something to show you."
Ty looked up from the paperwork he was filling out at his office desk.
"Yeah, what you got, Petey?"
Pete had been holding the suppressed Beretta behind his back, but now whipped it out with a flourish and set it down on the desk.
Ty picked up the weapon and examined it.
"Hmm ... nice, but isn't this suppressor sort of small for a nine mil?
Pete put on a wounded look.
"Everyone's a critic," he said with a mock sigh. "Don't you think you ought to try it out before you pass judgment?"
Ty gave his ranch foreman a wry grin.
"Yeah, I suppose you're right. Let's take it outside and give it a try."
After the two men were outside, Pete explained the use of the slide-lock mechanism, jacked a round into the chamber, and then handed the weapon back to Ty.
"Go ahead, try it out."
Ty took aim at a nearby tree stump and squeezed the trigger.
Ding ... WACK!
Pete guffawed at Ty's open-mouth look of surprise.
"Damn Petey, this thing beats the hell out of those big suppressors the military uses. How the hell did you accomplish that?"
"It's sort of a hybrid. I used urethane wipes and artificial environment technology."
"Wipes? You mean like a hush-puppy?"
Pete nodded.
"Urethane wipes allow use of a smaller can, but I increased the efficiency by using artificial environment technology."
Ty looked puzzled, so Pete explained.
"By adding a cooling substance, such as light machine oil, lithium grease, Breakfree, or even water, you can dramatically increase the noise reduction performance of a suppressor. Lithium Grease seems to be the most popular substance to use, because its effects last the longest before you need to add more. Most people report about thirty rounds before needing to add more grease, and that's fine, since the wipes will need to be replaced by then as well. That's what I used in this suppressor."
"Well I'm impressed, Petey, you are one heck of a foreman and this is one quiet weapon. It may not win any target shooting competitions with the bullets having to squeeze through the wipes, but that's not its intended purpose, anyway, right?"
Ty's comment caused the smile to fade from Pete's face.
"No, boss," he answered in a somber tone, "but it's plenty accurate for what needs to be done."